The event began with the head of Xbox Japan, Takashi Sensui, confessing that the Xbox 360 had "very much underperformed" in the country. Ever the optimist however, Sensui was keen to point out that certain areas of the 360 have been a triumph in Japan, with downloads from the Xbox Live Marketplace at a higher rate per unit than anywhere else in the world (apparently, five downloads per unit). Without wishing to be cruel, the words "scraping" and "barrel" come to mind.
Still, there were some interesting titles announced also, particularly if you're Japanese. A new Gundam game was shown (big in Japan, of course), and was swiftly followed by a declaration that Namco RPG Culdcept Saga would be going online over Xbox Live. Then - ZOMG! - there was the big one: a new, undisclosed Final Fantasy game will be appearing on the 360 in 2007, though no further details (such as whether it would be exclusive to the system) were spared.
There was also talk of Blue Dragon. Not the popular range of tasty stir-fry sauces you understand, but the RPG currently in development at the new studio of Final Fantasy guru Hironobu Sakaguchi, who also confirmed that a demo of the developer's next title, Lost Odyssey, will be distributed later in 2006. And sticking to the subject of RPGs, Tri-Ace (the studio responsible for Star Ocean) is at work on an unnamed action RPG. Oh, and for the retroheads amongst you, apparently Galaga and Pac-Man will be doing the rounds on Xbox Live Arcade in the near future.
Alas, many of the game announcements we had anticipated in our original news article failed to materialise, meaning there's still no confirmation that Xbox 360 versions of Phantasy Star, Virtua Fighter, Afterburner and Winning Eleven (a.k.a Pro Evolution Soccer) currently (or will ever) exist (though we'd eat our hat and all your hats if Pro Evo never made an X360 appearance), but it's probably fair to say that Microsoft may have helped further its chances in the Japanese market with some of today's announcements. Time, as they say, will tell.
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